p.s. ...... inspiration fuel

a wee bit of a postscript - some visual juice from the gem show ............

amethyst chunks

tangerine quartz points

amber nuggets

and last, but a long ways from being least ... slabs of lapis

seriously yummy .....

ciao for now

l i g a - kvk

where to start ......

....... it's been such an extraordinary week.
The Etsy Anniversary sale was a great success.  That success provided funding for a psychic consultation (a great story) and an amazing haul at the gem show (the story continues) ... so a huge huge thank you to my Etsy following ... I am so very blessed.

First the story of the psychic. 
I know, for myriad reasons, we've all lost touch with people in our lives.  After 13 years (maybe longer), I just reconnected with a dear friend.  I've tried off and on through the years to find her via the internet.  Back when we were in touch, she was working for her brother's backpack company, Osprey packs (world class, top of the line packs) as well as building a photo journalistic portfolio with a focus on child labor in India and building an adobe house in SW Colorado with her new husband.  We last saw each other when she came east to do a series of technical workshops for the packs.  I road along ... a glorious week of chatting and traveling.  Back in February, I took another shot and there she was. 

Rachel and her family, husband and 2 kids, had moved back to her home town of Santa Cruz, CA.  Along the way, she'd gone back to school and become a counselor.  Turns out she's also been developing her psychic gifts through the years as an added component to her counseling skills.  I emailed her straight away and waited and waited.  No idea if she'd gotten the email or if she was interested in reconnecting.  Then a few days ago, she emailed me back!  I burst into tears when I read her email ... I was absolutely overcome.

It's a teeny picture, but here's my long lost friend, Rachel Pfotenhauer.  Further emails were exchanged and, after my wonderful sale weekend, I decided to splurge and see if she would do a reading for me.  Not being particularly patient, I thought it would be helpful to do the reading before heading to the gem show.  It all fell together perfectly ... yesterday afternoon we did one of her full readings.  I've had my horoscope done with a private reading and I've had two other psychic readings, one in person, one distant - I wrote my questions, she sent me a tape of the reading.  Rachel's currently in Kauai, so our reading was over the phone.  Basically, I was blown away.  This was hands down the most thorough and coherent reading I could have hoped for.  Throw in reconnecting with a dear friend and it was about as wonderful as could be.

A big part of the reading was about my current work - All One Talismans.  The message was clear, brace myself and get ready, these are going to be big.  I asked if there was any advice on things to look for as I wondered through the gem show ... the answer - black something, maybe obsidian and something that looks like tiger's eye.  Basically, just listen to my intuition and I won't go wrong ... and stock up!

So stock up I did!  Here's my superb haul ...

I found some amazing things.  The 'tiger eye' stones I found are way more interesting than plain old tiger eye, they're fire etched agate ... I got a bunch!

The black ended up being black tourmaline nuggets along with some very dark kyanite and some African coconut discs.

I got a bunch of really excellent aquas ... some very cool Chinese turquoise (I just love those thin squares), apatite nuggets and a variety of aquamarine shards and nuggets.

Then there's the greens ... vesuvianite shards and more Chinese turquoise.

I got more nuggets in browns and some rich russets and red ... from right to left - African amber, scapolite, garnet, hessionite garnet and sunstone.

Then there's this very cool find ... apatite nuggets that I'm going to top drill - they're in the 1 to 1 1/2" long range.  I bought six ...

But hands down, the coolest thing I found was agatized bamboo.  I've never heard of such a thing.  But they are amazing ... and hollow!    They make a wonderful sound when they clink against each other.  I just need to clean out the cores.  I bought eight ...

Normally, the gem show is one of my big social events of the year.  Today, I wasn't so much anti-social as supremely focused ... a focus that paid off in spades. 

The mystery component of the Talismans arrived in the mail today ... experiments will ensue, the big reveal to come ... not sure when.  But stay tuned, 'cause like the song says, "I'm just so excited!"

l i g a - kvk

many happy things

So much to be thankful for today ... so many things are making me smile ...

I'm closing in on 100 members to this site!  Can't wait to see 3 digits on that little widget!   

Wo ... update!  Hold your horses, it's official ... I've got 3 digits on the widget!  Suh-weet!  
Thank you thank you thank you!

I spent a lovely day yesterday at the gem show.  Road trip with Cara, chatting nonstop for the 70 minute drive ... Seeing so many jeweler friends, such an amazing community of creative women in our area ... Spending exactly my budget with a few dollars to spare.

I had a vague idea of what I was looking for.  Sometimes I have a detailed list, sometimes I just go and see what catches my eye.  Yesterday was a follow my intuition day.  Here's my modest haul ...

First, I was drawn to yellows.  From the right: citrine nuggets, some very yummy heliodor aquamarine (who knew that aquamarine came in yellow?), sunstone nuggets with loads of copper shiller, and sumptuous teeny chrome tourmaline nuggets.

Then there was the yellow/green/chartreuse strands ... a mixed strand of lemon quartz cubes, teeny watermelon tourmaline nuggets and another new-to-me gem, shah mak sud jade from Afghanistan.

Then on to the blues ... I felt in desperate need of lapis and love these little tubes (2-3mm).  These thin cubes were a new shape so I got a small assortment - in addition to the lemon quartz, amethyst, iolite, blue quartz and paraiba quartz (enhanced colors, but they were inexpensive and I couldn't resist).

And these are seriously yummy ... aquamarine and tanzanite sanded nuggets.  They're a bit bigger, 10-12mm wide by 3-5mm.

And sometimes I splurge on a decadent little something ... like raw diamonds.  I'm such an addict.  Cara spotted these and the price was really quite good and I didn't have any black or red diamonds and, golly, a girl really should have an assortment, dontcha think?  I got 2 strands of each.

Black raw diamonds ... 2-3mm.  Treated, but again, I couldn't resist.

And then there's the red ones ... oh my goodness they're amazing.  Two graduated strands of natural red diamonds, 3-5mm.

And being the obsessive compulsive type that I can be, before leaving for the show, I wanted something new to put on my wrists.  It seemed like a good time to measure out a nice long length from my new assortment of antique brown leather cord, pop on a button and loop clasp and call it done.

And I had this one mostly put together, I just needed to tie the loop onto the end.  Not sure if I could sell these or not ... there's a ton of silver in this one which would make it really expensive.  I do love the weight of it.

Other things on my happy radar ... I've been doing a lot of visualization work in combination with something else that's new to me ... meridian tapping or EFT.  Mostly I've been working on money/scarcity issues and business applications.  I really like the idea of it and feel pretty sure some old patterns are starting to shift.  Lots of work on being open to whatever comes my way.  And talk about sweet synchronicity ... on Thursday this showed up on my doorstep ...

Okay, so I'm always looking at different on-line business blogs and sites and you know I'm a big fan of a couple of them.  Well, on Wednesday I watched an interview with Chris Guillebeau about his new book launch and thought that looked pretty interesting and was going to add it to my wish list.  Thursday, the UPS truck pulls up and plops this on my front porch ... FREE from Amazon!  How crazy is that?  Alright, so I know the 'big brother' implications of this and I'm not real happy about that, but I am pretty psyched about getting the book, so I'm going to try and not think about the big brother part.  I just started it and it looks like it's going to have a lot of useful information.

And then we got a bit of an income tax refund and decided to invest in a super nice juicer.  I was thrilled with the Acme when I got it, but it's turned out to not fit my juicing needs.  I do lots of greens and like to make a lot of juice at one time.  The centrifugal juicers don't get a lot of juice from greens (you have to run the pulp again) and are not so great if you want to refrigerate juice for a day or more.  Anybody in the Asheville area want a deal on a juicer, I've got the Acme listed on Craigslist.  So, here's the newest member of the family.  My Omega 8006 - a slooooow, masticating juicer ... 

I'm itching to get to work with my new gems ... have some ideas about what to do with those diamonds and I'm back to working on my Talismans.  I'm thinking they're going to be my main focus for a bit.  Well, I've got this coming week to work on them before working on a couple of June 1st wholesale orders.  I can see that the Talismans have enormous potential for growth and what I do is fairly different from what's out there right now.  So, I'm going to do something of a re-launch, hence the Startup book and all the business stuff I've been working on.  Moving forward, gettin' things done, havin' a good time ... what more could a girl ask? 

Yes, yes ... many many happy things!

feeling enormously blessed and ever so grateful.

Onward!

l i g a - kvk

p.s.  Thanks so much for those of you who took me up on the My Peeps discount.  

p.p.s.  I found a strange little exercise video that Maia Helles did and wanted to share ...

lucky girl

Funny thing ... I love doing things for other people, being the sleuth, creating and mailing off little surprises for friends and loved ones.  It just never occurs to me that anyone would do that for me.  So I let out a bit of a squeal when I checked my mail yesterday.  For parked right there in my mailbox was a little surprise package from Andrew.  I dashed inside and headed straight for the scissors to slice open my unexpected goody.  An even bigger squeal came when I emptied out the contents - carefully labeled ziploc bags with beautiful gemstone nuggets.  Oh my, they are so very lovely ...........

There's two kinds of amber, smooth and really rough and crystal quartz, jumbo faceted and hammered nuggets, jumbo citrine, amazing green garnet and top-drilled sunstone - just check out the copper shiller of that front piece of sunstone and how translucent the amber is.

Needless to say, I'm thrilled.  I've got my new cache of treasure sitting front and center on my worktable, visions of new creations beginning to form in my little head.  Delicious!
Thank you Andrew!  You are a gem.

with deep gratitude and many blessings - kvk

Jackie O's pearls + new jewels

I'm always on the lookout or listening for bits and pieces and clues for ideas and inspiration.  Include in that keeping my radar tuned for potential nice things I can do for someone else.  Nice things, little things, things that are easy and joyful for me, but could have great meaning for another.  Making jewelry is a small thing for me.  It's what I do, it's what I thrive on.  In the last couple of weeks, in between working on wholesale orders, I've had the opportunity to do some custom pieces.  A rare thing for me as I am usually quite hesitant to take on special requests.  All I can say is, I must be loosening up in my middle age.

The most recent one just went out in the mail.  It wasn't a special order, but one of my radar picks.  A recent conversation with my older sister gleaned the tidbit that she is obsessed with Jackie O's three strand pearl necklace.  Of course I remember seeing the necklace and there's been lots of 'first lady pearls' in the news thanks to Michelle O's stunning assortment of contemporary interpretations, bringing the pearl necklace to a whole new audience ... I especially love the Tom Binns pieces.  But my sister said the Jackie O version.  And I thought, "hey, I can do that!  The gem show's coming up and I'll do a bit of research and see what I pull off."

So yesterday I headed to Franklin for the gem show with my miniscule shopping list, perused and shopped for a couple of hours, found the exact pearls I was hoping for and headed home.  I had already made the 'bling' piece for the three strand closure.  Jackie's was emerald and gold, mine is pmc, white topaz and sapphires - close, sort of.  Since I got home early, I set to work right away and, well, see what you think.  Here's the clasp ...

And the full necklace.  The shortest strand is 17", graduating to 19" ...

There's something enormously satisfying about knotting perfectly graduated strands of pearls.  This is in the mail today ... I'm hoping a nice little surprise for my sister.  Unless she reads this, which I'm thinking is not likely, I don't know, we'll see.

Then there was the Talisman style necklace for a friend ...

I don't normally do text in pieces - there's just so much out there, it's hard to do anything different.  But a friend had asked if I might be able to do something with her word choices plus a couple other elements and I figured I'd give it a shot.  The other unusual thing here - the text nuggets are sterling silver pmc.  Yep!  My first batch of mixed and fired pmc3 mixed with pmc Pro.  My letter stamps were kind of big so I wanted to use the sterling for the additional shrinkage.  There will be more sterling silver goodies to come - hopefully later this month.

And then I got to make a special order version of one of my favorite new pieces.  This one is for the woman who cuts my hair, I guess that would be hair stylist, but the stylie part only lasts until I wash it.  I'm not known for fancy hairstyles or fancy product usage.  Anyway, she's buying this for a birthday present to herself.  

And lastly, this wasn't a special order, but it's a piece you may recognize.  I made this component a while back - channel set tunduru sapphires in a bar of pmc.  I originally planned to attach it to leather, then changed my mind, then decided to list the component on Etsy, it got several 'hearts' but didn't sell.  Then one day my eye caught a zip-loc bag full of bits of chain - a tiny rolo link that I've had for years.  I've always loved this chain and seeing it in a pile I finally figured out what to do with that little sapphire bar.  I'll be re-listing the finished piece on Etsy first of the week. 

Silver prices have been all over the place in the last couple of weeks and took a nose-dive in the last few days.  Normally I price things based on replacement costs, but because I've had this chain for a while and there's a lot of it in this piece, I'm going to price it at the old chain price.  Yeah, I'm softening up. 

And new jewels! 

Like I was saying, I didn't really need much of anything, but I'm always on the lookout for new and intriguing jewels.  Lately I've been obsessed with hammered gemstone nuggets - really rough, chiseled looking facets.  They're pretty hard to find, but they are out there.  Some on Etsy, a few on some gemstone sites.  I saw very little of this sort of thing yesterday, but did find a few strands to play around with.

I love the warmth of this quartz.  So much of it looked plastic and glaring and garish.  This strand was perfect.

I had to get two strands of this green amethyst - looks like green ice don't you think?

A bit of a splurge, but this gemstone is so so so hard to resist ... this not quite so chiseled moss aquamarine.  A bit more refined, but still rough enough for my plans.

And this was my big splurge, golden rutilated quartz ... $50 for a really short strand, 5 bucks a nugget - oof!  Thing is, I saw it first thing in the morning and kept thinking about it the whole time I was there, so I knew I better succumb or regret it later.  It's just so raw and I know it's going to look amazing with some big chunky something to be designed sometime soon.

All in all, a good trip and a good couple of days and, come to think of it, a good couple of weeks.  

I can't wait to see where these new jewels inspire me to go next.  That's the whole point, discovery and exploration and innovation and the delicious unknown.

Onward.

Blessings - kvk

a brief history

Working on these last two jeweled crosses got me to thinking about my other jeweled crosses so, I thought I'd share some images of past work ... and of course share images of the newest treasures all bright and shiny and ready to find new and loving homes.

Well, these first two aren't crosses, but are my first bejeweled pieces.  The images are not so great - just scans, but I still love the pieces ... 

I call them Vestiges of Byzantium ...the earrings

and the pendant

Then there was this cross I made for a friend in PT.  I cut a cross out of thick mica, wrapped it in pmc, drilled a hole in the center, then more pmc with a wash of 22k pmc in the center.  A total experiment, but a pretty successful one ... at least I thought so.

Then the crosses started getting more fancy.  

I gave this one to my sister to accompany her breast cancer journey.

White topaz in the center, peridot trillions, sapphire and moonstone cabs with a 22k pmc wash in the recesses.

From last year ... peridot and raw diamonds, a sapphire at the crest, hanging from a braid of dark blue silk and tiny faceted gems.

Another one from the same time.  A yellow sapphire in the center surrounded by a lot of raw diamonds, with a tiny ruby at the top, hanging from a braid of plum silk and tiny gems.

And my most recent creations ... the raw ruby cross on multi-strand leather.  I love the ragged edges around the rubies and the color of the stones is just wonderful.

And then there's my pièce de résistance.  Dave says this may be one of the most beautiful pieces I've ever made ... and that's saying something!  He's seen it all - the very bad and 

the truly extraordinary.   I call it Starry Night ...  

 And I don't know what it is, but it really does feel like a very special piece.  Do you ever feel that way about your work?  Something will seem very normal during the creation process and then, upon completion, you realize something has transpired and the work has been transformed, transcended ... it's become more than the sum of it's parts.  

Here's a different angle. 

I'm not sure where this one is going.  I sent off a bunch of work to Artisans on Taylor.  ArtFest is next week and I always try to stock them up with my most interesting pieces.  For some reason, Starry Night, didn't want to go to PT.  Not sure where it wants to go...

But for now, I do know where I want to go!  Dave and I are heading down to St. Augustine, FL for a long weekend.  Warmth, sun and sand!  I am so in need of a salt water fix and they've got lots - hard to say which I love more, the salt marshes or the ocean.  

But I won't have to choose.

Hope you enjoyed the show!   Have a lovely weekend.

blessings - kvk

 

components update

Well, best laid plans and all that...........
I really thought I'd get some new pieces up on Etsy today.  Thing is, I started hauling out all my little bins of components and decided to sell a few more than I was first thinking.  Please keep in mind, selling my components is something I rarely do and, having had someone buy my components, have the pieces cast then sell them as copyrighted originals, I always do it very mindfully.  So, that said ... I got a bit carried away culling little treasures to share on Etsy.  There's the pricing, which took awhile, but then I spent the better part of the afternoon playing around with how I want to photograph them.  Finally, I hit on a look that I like, but by then it was too late to really dive in.  So I thought I'd do a quick post to pique your curiosity.  Here's the assortment that I hope to get listed tomorrow .......

 
And this is a closeup of one of the necklaces I designed for the gemstone stacker beads.  I'm really loving the look of the 1mm leather cord with the brown waxed linen wrap.  I spent at least a couple of days this week trying out different looks for the necklace component.  I still want to use my handcut leather, but need to work on the details.  I've also done a fun closure on the bead chain.  I slid one of my KVK buttons on the chain and wired the end to keep it from sliding off.  Then I wired the other end into a loop.  I think it looks very cool and it seems to function nicely.  You can see it better in the above photo. 

I'm actually going to re-shoot these, but here's a couple of closeups of the gemstone beads.  These are the large rings with sapphires and rubies.  They've got a wonderful heft - no lightweight beads here - and average 12 x 5mm.  They'll sell for $42 each ...

And this is one of the medium size gemstone rings with yellow sapphires.  It's about 10 x 5mm and will be $36.  And, yes, I will be doing these in actual 'ring' sizes with the PMC Pro.  Really looking forward to those.

Okay, that's it for now.  I should be back tomorrow after I get some goodies up on Etsy.

spring blessings and heartfelt prayers for Japan, the earthquake victims and their families.  Having experienced the 7.2 Loma Prieta quake in '89, I can't begin to imagine the force of this one.
- kvk

new stuff

Gotta say, I'm having fun.  It's pouring rain outside and I don't have to go anywhere or do anything but focus on my work.  Frankincense resin has been burning and my Zero 7 Pandora station is hitting the spot, although I may switch over to the Incredible String Band (60's British folk).   

My first pieces using my haul of gemstone gravel are in the tumbler.  I've been thinking about these for ages and I'm dying for them to be ready to play around with.  The current plan is they'll stack on either leather or ball chain and you can add to them and switch them around, which means I'm planning to sell components on Etsy - sort of, well at least that's what I'm thinking right now ... we'll see.  The stones are rubies and sapphires in assorted seriously yummy colors.

Fueling my creative burst are multiple glasses of a really good batch of fresh veggie juice, toasted almonds and this glorious discovery ...

... an enormous baked purple sweet potato, and I do mean purple.  Not even beet red, but dead on purple.  When I bought it, I had no idea what it would look like inside, so I wanted my first experience to be just the unadulterated sweet potato, well with a little butter.  It was kind of strange - eating it and tasting something familiar, looking at it and seeing something quite strange.  I'm thinking how much fun these will be to put with other things - they are just so beautiful.  Now I'll be keeping my fingers crossed they're still at the grocery store next time.

While I'm waiting for the new jewels in the tumbler, I started working on my stainless steel foil origami box to fire my PMC Pro.  I've got the steel container from firing copper and bronze clay, but in reading about the new PMC Pro at CoolTools, they were talking about steel spalling and making a mess and here was their nifty solution.  So I bought their high fire steel foil.  Of course, me being the pigheaded sort that I am, I said "pish posh" to the recommended gloves and went to work ...

 
Note to self ... follow the instructions.
So right now I'm waiting for the slice in my knuckle to stop bleeding.  Seemed like a good time to do a quick blogland update.
I'll be back soon ...  when my gemstone stackers are done.
Glorious anticipation.

ttfn
blessings - kvk

p.s.  someone recently asked me what 'ttfn' was ... ta ta for now!
p.p.s.  here's 7 1/2 minutes of exquisite viewing ... Human Planet slide show ... absolutely stunning

sneak peek

While riding my emotional pendulum, I've actually been getting a fair amount of work done.  Wholesale orders, special orders, repairs and best of all ... NEW WORK!  And the really incredible thing is, I'm actually going to list some pieces on Etsy tomorrow.  Kind of a Ripley's Believe It or Not moment.

So I've decided to post a sneak peek of two seriously wonderful new pieces.
You've seen the focal point of this first piece ... I finally figured out what to do with the jeweled pendant I showed you way back in January in this post.  I came up with the bail idea and then that assembly's been sitting on my worktable waiting for inspiration.  I spent most of yesterday afternoon playing around with all sorts of combinations and then it all finally fell together in splendid fashion.

I love all the details ... the leather strap handcut and glued, silk wraps, the button closure - I forged a pmc pebble flat, then attached a KVK button with a tube rivet, and those jumbo pearls are the most delicious color that picks up all the colors of the tunduru sapphires in the pendant and bail.  Actually, I'm going to reshoot this since the gemstone colors don't show up very well, but you get the general idea.

The other necklace in our sneak peek is a humdinger!  I finally got back out to the Arboretum last week and pulled off at Bent Creek to gather a few quartz pebbles.  I brought them home, chucked them in the tumbler for a couple of days to clean them up, drilled some holes and followed my nose from there on out.

The little jeweled drop is set with some of the new Songea sapphires I found on Ebay.  The colors are perfect with the quartz.  And then there's the retrofitted links that are just an excellent counterpoint to the rough stones.  Everything's strung on my own dark espresso silk cord.  Very very yummy!

There'll be more jeweled treasures to come as my mondo cache (1300 carats) of rubies and sapphires finally arrived from Thailand.  And good golly do I love this stuff - basically gemstone gravel.

I've got another 500 carats of white sapphires coming and a bid in on 500 carats of peridot.  One hopes that will hold me for awhile.  I've also got some of the new PMC Pro coming and I'm really excited about seeing what it will do.  I'm thinking I'll be back in the ring business pretty soon.

Rightio!  So that's it for now.  Look for at least four new pieces in my Etsy shop tomorrow afternoon.
ttfn along with happy blessings ('cause Django Rhinehardt's playing on Pandora) - kvk